Tasteless Brew

[sidman]

Brewed a lager ,the ingredients were 1can Coopers lager ,500g LDM ,200g corn syrup,15g golden cluster pellets (5 min boil),been in the bottle for 3 weeks and it is a nice colour good carbonation but no taste ,do flavours develope or do they mellow out with age,used a saflager S23 yeast at 12 degrees so expected more flavour any ideas?

[rwh]

You brewed a lager. The lager style has no flavour in my opinion. You want flavour? Brew a nice ale, porter or stout. I'd recommend giving this recipe a go as the flavours are beautifully balanced:

1 Coopers Pale Ale kit
1kg LDME
250g Light Crystal malt
100g Carapils
12g of goldings hops at 15 minutes

Method:
1. crack and steep the light crystal and carapils for 20 minutes in 2L water at 70-80°C.
2. Strain the grains out, put the liquid in a large pot, bring to the boil.
3. Add the hops
5. After 15 minutes, turn off the heat dissolve LDME and kit can.
6. Half fill your fermenter with cold water and add your wort
7. Pitch yeast

[wildschwein]

Yeah sometimes lagers can be a little too clean and too light in flavour. Unlike ales they don't really have the esterish characteristic and that can leave them a bit bland. I'd probably be inclined to save it for summer and serve it as an ice cold lawnmower lager.

[Jedo_03]

sidman - you want a lager with taste then try TWO-ROW by maltshovel

(only) 2 weeks in the bottle - me and the missus cracked one sunday night for a taste.... nice fffiishshsh when we opened the bottle... bit sulphury on the nose (expected with a lager) but...GRUEUEUE... it was 'orrible.... took one sip each and cleaned the kitchen drains out with the rest of it...
It's the colour of newcastle brown
Ale yeast supplied with the kit
brewed out in 12 days
wasted a kilo of BE
decided to put the other 15 bottles in the caravan and try it again when it gets near xmas...
Jedo

[gavind]

i'm glad to hear you say that about the malt shovel 2-row lager. i did it about a year ago and mine was really dark also. at first i thought i didnt measure my water properly (the fermenter i used only has a 23l line) but i must have. it does get better though. i finally had the last one about a month ago. still not quite to my taste but drinkable all the same.

[Jedo_03]

i'm glad to hear you say that about the malt shovel 2-row lager. i did it about a year ago and mine was really dark also. at first i thought i didnt measure my water properly (the fermenter i used only has a 23l line) but i must have. it does get better though. i finally had the last one about a month ago. still not quite to my taste but drinkable all the same.

hang on lad... how much water did you use...
the recipe only gives you 11.5 litres
Ahh - mebbes your memory isn't that good like mine...
and you say you drank your last one after 11 month....
well ahve gorra lang wait then...
Jedo

[Rysa]

I've got a tin of this in the cupboard to make a Becks.
Buggered if i know where i got the recipe but thought i'd give it a go.
Fingers crossed.

[shane_vor]

I'm with rwh on this one, have found lagers to be pretty disappointing. I guess it's just not my style. Maybe you could try some pilsners ?

[earle]

I had steered away from lagers due to lack of success but recently did this one

Morgans Blue mountain Lager
Morgans MB choc malt
1kg Coopers BE1
Hersburker dry hop
Saflager yeast

Result was IMHO a really nice dark lager, maybe marzen or bock in style. Due to the choc malt it had more character. Probably not a true lager due to my temps but definitely different to my ales. The darker malt helps cover up other shortcomings of a lager so makes it easier to brew but I think it adds more character anyway. I like it.

Earle

[Trough Lolly]

You brewed a lager. The lager style has no flavour in my opinion. You want flavour? Brew a nice ale, porter or stout.

With all due respect, I beg to differ - Lagers have no flavour? Rubbish!
An excellent, crisp, flavoursome lager is not easy to make
A weak, poorly fermented lager like beer is a common result and one of the main reasons why brewers, especially relatively new brewers, find they don't bother making lagers and stick to ales and wheat beers that happily ferment at room temperature.
I have Oktoberfest and Dortmunder recipes that, in tastings, have been well received by hop heads and grain munchers. The keys to making a good lager are temperature control, patience and a balanced recipe. Yes, most lager kits are bland - but that doesn't mean that the lager style is flavourless. I have a keg of Steam beer (amber lager) that's every bit as good as a copper ale but without the fruity esters and plenty of noble hop aroma and flavour to balance the melanoidin laden munich grains. The keg of Dortmunder (lager, think DAB) I took out of the fermenter this afternoon is, IMHO, excellent straight out of the fermenter - fresh, with spicy citrus notes that are balanced by Weyermann pilsner malt and a small addition of Munich malt. The dry hopped Saaz adds balance and a lovely aromatic complexity to complement the all grain malt profile.
Come on over, rwh, and we'll dispel the lagers are bland myth!!
And whilst everyone who brews carrys on about VB, and I can't blame them, lets remember that this incredibly popular megaswill beer is in fact, a danish lager...
//flamesuit on//!
Cheers,
TL
P.S. Both recipes are on the aussiehomebrewer forum.

[gibbocore]

VB?????

expalin more please????

[Trough Lolly]

It's a simple story...the myth is that Victoria Bitter is a Bitter Ale. Wrong. It's a Danish Lager recipe that's been Australianised...

[rwh]

Sorry, what I meant was that the "lager" style is bland and uninteresting, not that all lagers are bland and uninteresting. Those others that you mention are nice flavoursome brews. Heineken and its siblings would be the kind of lager style I was thinking of, and that's the kind of beer you get if you brew up the Coopers lager can without adding anything to it.

I've recently started putting lagers down in my brew fridge, first was the Munich Dunkel, followed by an AG pilsener. You're right about them being more difficult to get right though; they're my next challenge.

[Trough Lolly]

Ahhh, I see! I agree that basic lagers can be somewhat uninspiring, as are basic ales. Before I brewed my own, I was in England on holidays and went out of my way to find export Fosters instead of drinking the "warm, flat pommy beer", ignorantly overlooking the fact that I was in the land that had Timothy Taylor Landlord Ale, or anything from Murston's, Fullers or Young etc...
For the first 12 months in the brewing wilderness I used to think that a kit plus a kilo of dextrose and nothing else was as good as homebrew could get! I only drank the stuff to save money but when I went to a party, I'd stop by and grab a half slab of VB...
I believe that a "good" ale, let's take an APA or a Stout or an IPA for example, is easier to brew up than a "good" dunkel or maerzen or dortmunder.
Now, I'm not saying that one style is necessarily better than the other - hell, I love all of them - but to my limited experience, I'd suggest that brewing a featureless lager (or ale, stout etc) can leave brewers with a bad impression of a particular style and it's much easier not to go the whole hog with temp controlled fridges and yeast management when you can easily brew a flavoursome ale instead. But that isn't to say that a well made lager can't float your boat in the flavour stakes!
Cheers,
TL